BOISE, Idaho, Aug. 26, 2010 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The White House oil spill commission is expected to consider pushing the oil industry to create a self-governing body to set up and enforce tough safety standards, in order to prevent another devastating oil spill.
That's an excellent idea, says Don Gillispie, a 45-year veteran of the nuclear industry and current CEO of Alternate Energy Holdings (www.aehipower.com).
Such an industry-created self-regulatory organization helped save nuclear power after the Three Mile Island incident, explains Gillispie, who helped set up the organization, and "the parallels with the oil industry are incredible," he says.
The industry's investigation of Three Mile Island showed that other plants had had similar problems long before the incident, just as the oil industry has had a slew of near blowouts and other potential disasters before the Deepwater Horizon spill. If the reasons for those previous problems had been discovered and corrective measures taken in the nuclear power industry, then the Three Mile Island incident would never have happened, Gillispie says. Similarly, if the oil industry had made operational and safety improvements in the wake of past problems, the Gulf oil spill would never have happened either.
After Three Mile Island, the nation's utilities got together and formed an organization called the Institute of Nuclear Power Operation (INPO) (http://www.inpo.info/Index.html). At the time, Gillispie was working for the Tennessee Valley Authority. He was loaned by TVA to help create INPO. His role: developing one of the cornerstone programs at the INPO. Called 'events analysis', the idea was to investigate every worrisome event at the nation's nuclear power plants, figure out why it happened, and then recommend changes to hardware and procedures at all plants to make sure it never happened again. The key was INPO then visited each plant to ensure the recommendations were implemented.
INPO has been tremendously successful. "We haven't had a big event since TMI," says Gillispie. "We caught problems at plants and headed them off."
He adds, though, that such an industry self-regulatory organization won't work, for the oil industry or any other, unless it is taken seriously by the industry and have been given power and teeth. "The industry has to say, 'we have a lot at stake, both in lives and financially, and we know we are not performing as well as we should.' The oil industry has to say, 'we have had Exxon Valdez and many oil leaks and we have not learned from those. Why don't we form an organization and improve our record?'"
In addition to spotting problems and fixing them, the nuclear industry's organization, INPO, ensures that nuclear plant operators are trained properly. One of the lessons from TMI was that operators didn't have sufficient training. So INPO oversees each utility's training program to ensure it meet standards.
Why do nuclear utilities comply with the INPO's edicts? Because they are hostages of each other's performance and also the organization has real teeth in the form of financial clout. Utilities pay what essentially amounts to an insurance premium to the organization. If INPO's inspections show that a plant meets all standards, the premium is low. But if it finds problems, the premium rises quickly. So utilities have a tremendous financial incentive to carry out INPO's recommendations. "It's worked really well," says Gillispie.
The oil industry should learn from the nuclear industry, he says. "We started by saying, 'we can't have another Three Mile Island.' They have the same image problem now with the spill in the Gulf. They would benefit greatly by creating a self-regulation organization and putting real teeth in it."
Such an organization is not cheap. "But it is a lot cheaper than the consequences," says Gillispie. "The consequences from the oil spill are huge to BP and the rest of the industry. An organization like INPO is something with universal value for industries that can self-destruct - and these big industries can."
About Alternate Energy Holdings, Inc. (http://www.AlternateEnergyHoldings.com) -- Alternate Energy Holdings develops and markets innovative clean energy sources. The company is the nation's only independent nuclear power plant developer seeking to build new power plants in multiple non-nuclear states. Other projects include Energy Neutral(TM), which removes energy demands from homes and businesses (http://www.EnergyNeutralinc.com) Colorado Energy Park (nuclear and solar generation), and Green World Water(TM), which assists developing countries with nuclear reactors for power generation (http://www.GreenWorld-H2O.com), production of potable water and other suitable applications. AEHI China, headquartered in Beijing, develops joint ventures to produce nuclear plant components and consults on nuclear power.
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